


Not the Only Traveller

by carrieonfighting



Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Demon!Shane, Ireland, M/M, Plot, Slow Burn, the devil??
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-02
Updated: 2018-09-05
Packaged: 2019-07-05 22:17:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15872817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carrieonfighting/pseuds/carrieonfighting
Summary: A teenage girl is hit by a bus in Chicago. Ryan and Shane spend the night on location in Ireland, and get more than evidence of the supernatural. Someone else is playing the strings of fate, and the Kingdom of Hell itself is at stake.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> wow dramatic summary!! im back with more demon shane goodness...strap in.
> 
> Gratitude to Em for proof-reading!

**BELOW**  
It was honestly just like every other day, she would think, when she looked back. A Tuesday…maybe. A bike ride to work, definitely. A stray stone in the road. A crash, an oncoming bus. Rats. 

Hazel often wondered what her last words had been – she couldn’t remember the conversation she’d had with her dad when she’d left the house. Undoubtedly something banal. She had no doubt that those people that had great last words – _kiss me, Hardy,_ was the only thing coming to mind, but they were out there – had said something ridiculous, and the people who had been at the death had made up something more befitting of their stature. 

Hazel’s death had been too quick for anyone to realise that there were last words to be spoken, and at any rate her twenty-year-old stature didn’t really warrant last words more inspiring than “I’ll see you later.”

That was ironic. 

Anyway, there had been a bike, and a bus, and a crash, and a scream – hers? Who knew – and then nothing, nothing, falling, darkness-

And suddenly, she was in an office. A nice office, with a dark wood floor, and a large bookshelf, and a leather sofa. She turned, taking in a fancy lamp, and windows with the blinds drawn – was it night-time? It had been daytime when she’d-

At that point, her stomach lurched, and she vomited all over the nice hardwood floor. 

“Oh, Jesus,” A voice said, and she heaved again. “Can you – hang on – how the fuck did you get in here?”

“Where am I?” She croaked, tears leaking from the corners of her eyes. “I don’t – I don’t understand.”

“Who are you?” The speaker was sat behind a nice desk, with an outdated computer on it, staring at her. When she turned to face him, he leapt to his feet – he was tall, but narrow enough to avoid imposing, with sandy brown hair and a non-descript shirt and tie. Young-ish. He was the man who matched the office. Hazel was distressed.

“I was on my bike,” She said, feeling panic build in the back of her throat. She wanted her dad. 

“How did you get in here?” The tall man asked again. 

“I don’t know,” She gulped. “I don’t know, I don’t-” Now her chest was heaving, breaths coming thick and fast but never bringing any oxygen with them.

“Woah, just – calm down there, kid,” The tall man said, holding his hands out placatingly and moving out from behind his desk, in his office, on the other side of the world, apparently. “Don’t panic.” He had an awkward gait, perhaps made more awkward by the fact that he was deliberately trying to move as slowly as possible. 

“Panic?” Hazel squawked. “I was hit by a bus!”

“You were hit by a bus?” The man said, but it was in a way that said _good, we’re getting more info now_ , rather than _what an astonishing turn of events!_ “What’s your name?”

“H-Hazel,” She said, wiping away the tears now streaming freely down her face. “Hazel Montgomery.” 

“Any, uh, middle names?” The tall man asked, slowly but surely moving towards a set of filing cabinets by the windows. 

“No?” She asked, baffled. 

“Where are you from, Hazel?”

“Evanton. Near Chicago.” Her palms were sweating fiercely.

“Oh, I’m from around there!” The tall man said, delighted. “You’re sure you don’t know how you got here?”

“Yes, I’m sure,” She exclaimed, wiping away fresh tears. “Where the hell is this place? Who are you?”

The tall man’s lips quirked ironically. “I’m Shane. I’m here to help, I swear.” And then he opened the filing cabinet, reaching an arm impossibly far inside and pulling out a file seemingly at random. He flicked through it, whilst Hazel watching in astonishment. She was losing feeling in her feet; ice was creeping up her spine and along the backs of her arms. Something was really, truly, wrong here.

“Hazel Montgomery, Chicago,” Shane murmured, coming to a stop. “April 2020. Road accident…collision with a bus, you said that. Paramedics reported her dead on arrival.”

Her? Me, the creeping voice in the back of her mind whispered, and the cold advanced further, freezing her lungs and making her palms clammy. “What are you talking about?” She whispered, clenching her fists to stop them shaking. 

“But you still shouldn’t be here, no matter what the evaluation says,” He mused, reading through the file with one hand in his hair. “This is my office. Nobody comes here.”

“Nobody comes where?” At that, he seemed to remember that she was there, and he put the file carefully back in the cabinet. He shut it, and then moved to stand by the window.

“Do you understand what’s happened, Hazel?” He said, in a horrifyingly gentle voice. “The bus? Your report? You seem like a smart girl. I think you can work it out.”

“No,” She sniffed. “I don’t – I can’t. Please.” She was shaking her head, almost mechanically, a panic response to something she couldn’t even begin to comprehend.

“You died,” Shane said, and with that the cold reached even the last vestiges of her fingertips, and she felt her breath halt in her chest, and her entire world shattered like brittle glass. She stood there for a long time, staring at the grain in the hardwood floor, feeling every inch of her body – she could smell the old books in the bookshelves, feel her nails puncturing her palms, _how could she be dead_ –what a marvel of engineering it was, that she could feel all these things.

Shane let her stand, quietly, leaning back against the filing cabinet.

“Where am I?” She finally said, after a long time. 

“Jeez,” Shane exhaled, running a hand through his hair and making it stick out every which way. “You've got a knack for the awkward questions, bud.”

“The after-life?” She asked, and though the concept had occurred to her before it had never weighed particularly heavily on her mind – it was something to worry about another time, something that wouldn’t even matter until after the fact and at that point it would be too late to worry anyway, but now it seemed really very important indeed.

“Kind of,” He said, with a wry quirk of his lips that made Hazel fairly worried – more worried than she already was. She was becoming oddly numb, to be honest.

Then Shane pulled the blinds up, and Hazel looked out the window onto something utterly incomprehensible to the human eye.

Red, as far as the eye could see. Flames, burning. A pit, deep below, from which plumes of lava erupted and broke in the air, whilst they looked out from the nice office at a vantage point too far away to suffer any harm. 

This was hell. With a capital H, Hell. And she – she was in it.

“What the fuck?” She said without even thinking, and Shane let out a shocked gasp of laughter. “How am I in Hell? I was a good fucking person!”

“I don’t know, Hazel Montgomery,” Shane said, reaching over and closing the blinds again before the ever-shifting flames could drive Hazel insane. Could she go insane in Hell? Did it even matter? Maybe she’d already gone insane, and this was some bizarre hallucination-

“No, you’re definitely dead,” Shane said, and Hazel came to a conclusion that had been percolating in the back of her mind without her realising. The nice office, the view, the business casual-

“Are you a demon?” She asked, and the wry smile vanished. He crossed his arms over his chest.

“I think you could probably say that,” He said. 

“You don’t look like a demon,” She said, and then clapped a hand over her mouth in shock.

“That’s a little racist, don’t you think, Hazel?” He asked, cocking his head to one side and eyeing her. 

“R-racist?” She gulped, and a sudden wheeze of laughter took her by surprise. “Is that why I’m in hell?”

“God, no, I was – I was obviously joking,” Shane threw his hands in the air, flailing his long arms exasperatedly. She laughed again – the faux indignance on his face kind of reminded her of her dad.

Oh, jeez.

“Am-” Her voice broke, stalled, “Am I gonna see my dad again?” Shane’s face fell, immediately telling her everything she needed to know, and the tears were coming again. Hazel had never considered herself a crier, per se, but then, she’d never died before. You learn new things about yourself every day.

“You’ll see him again, Hazel,” Shane said, softly, quietly. “It’ll – it’ll just be a while.”

“My – my dad’s not going to go to hell!” Hazel said, swallowing the lump in his throat. “He’s a good person!”

“I don’t think you’re supposed to be here,” Shane said, brow furrowing. “Something’s gone wrong, somewhere. Ugh, that means I’m going to be the one that has to sort it out.”

 **ABOVE**  
It was honestly just like any other day – a plane ride, a phone camera shoved in his face, Ryan bouncing his knee in the seat next to him until he vibrated. Shane sighed, and leaned his head back, and the minute he closed his eyes –

“Do you think we’ll see a demon?”

“You know I don’t,” Shane said, trying to keep the bite from his voice. He’d slept badly the night before; tossing and turning, plagued with vivid dreams and strange voices. It was just another shoot. A demon one, yeah, which meant Ryan’s…Ryan-ness would be turned up to eleven, but just another shoot. 

Ryan never told him much about the places they went before they arrived. It was part of his authenticity schtick – he wanted a genuine first impression from Shane. He didn’t mind, really. The old houses, the voices in the dark…something inside Shane delighted in it. A deep, primal part of him. It made him want to shout, yell into the deep forest, laugh in the face of Ryan’s fear, say every weird thing that came into his head. 

But he didn’t like aeroplanes. No leg room. And Bergara was snoring, frustratingly cute even when he was annoying Shane. 

They landed in Ireland in the middle of the night and trudged out to the hotel on heavy feet. Ryan was quiet, eyelids drooping with the weight of the early morning. This was what they did now. 

And there it was – the house on the peninsula, the edge of the Irish Sea. Facing out towards Britain as if to say, “fuck you!” Or maybe Shane was putting words in the house’s mouth. 

A flashing red light. A floorboard creaking. The tenor voice announcing “hello, and welcome to Buzzfeed Unsolved.” Customary shake of the head at “are ghosts real?” 

“This is Loftus Hall, which has been long rumoured to play home to the _Devil._ ” Ryan’s voice did that, that thing. The really intense thing. Shane felt like he knew the cadences of Ryan’s voice better than he knew his own; weeks of his life spent listening to voice-overs, late night phone calls, old episodes of his own show (wow). 

“And for the first time in a long time, Shane and I will be staying overnight.” Ryan said, flashing white teeth down the camera lens, and Shane jolted out of his reverie.

“You better fucking sleep, my guy,” He mumbled, and Ryan huffed a laugh. 

“Get ready for a storm,” He said. “Ryan doesn’t deal with demons. Especially the King of Hell.” 

“Oh, so we’re referring to ourselves in the third person now?”

“Yeah. We are.” Ryan said, folding his arms. TJ was spacing out behind the camera; a sign that he should move it along.

“So lay it on me. All the spooky shit that they claim went down here.” Shane leaned back in his chair leisurely, master of his own domain. Which wasn’t saying much, considering he was sat in an abandoned house in a godforsaken corner of Ireland. 

He liked this one. A lot of the places they visited had character, but the atmosphere in this old manor house was Off The Charts. He didn’t know who’s dick Ryan had sucked to get a camera crew in here, but the episode was going to be a tour de force.

“This place reeks of Catholic guilt,” Shane said aloud, interrupting Ryan’s narration. He usually listened just fine to the stories behind the locations, but tonight he was distracted by the house. They were sat in the front foyer, the sweeping staircase behind, and the wide double doors leading out onto the flat shore outside. It was typical Unsolved set-up; just the boys lit, the background in shadow for maximum Spook.

“…yeah, so, anyway,” Ryan continued, “In 1666, the Tottenham family received a visit from a ship, and a young man. One night, the family and the visitor were playing cards, when Anne, Charles’ daughter, reached under the table to pick up a dropped card. She saw that the young man had a cloven foot, and when she asked about it, the man _leapt through the ceiling._ The place where the hole was reportedly still visible _to this day._ ”

“Oh boy!” Shane said, flicking his torch upwards. “Where?!”

“In the drawing room,” Ryan said. “Don’t worry, we’ll go and look. Couldn’t be a self-respecting demon hunter otherwise.”

“Do we hunt demons now?!” Shane demanded. “I thought you didn’t fuck with demons?” 

“I’m getting tired of the lack of them fucking with me, on camera,” Ryan said. “It’s time to employ more aggressive tactics.”

“You heard it here first, folks. We’re gonna dance with the devil tonight.”

“God,” Ryan muttered.

“No sleep for the ghoul boys.”

“I regret everything. I regret it.”

 **BELOW**  
Hazel sat with her knees under her chin, back to the bookcase, staring at the blinds behind the desk. Shane’s head bobbed as he hung up the phone, only to immediately dial another number. 

“Hey, Andromalius? It’s Shane. I've got a - a stray girl just appearing in my office. Yeah, I know where the children go. She’s like, 16, and she definitely doesn’t belong here. Look, I rely on you to sort shit like this out for me, I’m still getting to grips with it. Fuck, I keep swearing in front of her.”

“Where do the children go?” She asked, feeling like the voice speaking was not her own. She was numb, fuzzy inside. 

“Hmm? Oh, not here. This is hell.” Of course, that was explanation enough.

“So…what do you do with them?”

“Send ‘em upstairs.” Shane gestured, and Hazel made a face. “God, please don’t vomit again.”

“Heaven?!”

“Honestly, I don’t know any better than you. Can’t be worse than here.”

“Can’t you just send me…upstairs?”

“We haven’t got the right paperwork.” Hazel gaped at him. “Don’t give me that look. Every soul is accounted for, and you’re not. We have to make sure everyone gets what they deserve.” He ran his hand over the five o’ clock shadow on his jaw. “I guess I’m more like Hades than the devil, really.”

“Been a while since I read those books,” Hazel muttered.

“What, the entire mythology of Ancient Greece?”

“No. The ones about the kids who were half gods. And they fought monsters.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“The blazing fires seem to skew more Christian than Classical.” Hazel gestured to the blinds, shuddering at the thought of what she’d seen behind them. 

“Yeah, I’m working on that. Nobody seems to care what I do, so we’re working on implementing a more transparent decision-making process in our applicants’ eternal damnation. And a more tailor-made approach to individual punishments. Sisyphus-style.”

“The rock dude.” Hazel said. 

“Yyyyup,” Shane said, popping the P. The two sat in silence for a while, Shane leaning back in his fancy office chair and Hazel in her best foetal position. 

“Is – is Hell boring?” She finally asked. “It seems…really boring.”

“You're kidding. I’m having a great time. Paperwork, you having a breakdown on my office floor. Brilliant.” 

The phone rang and Shane snatched it from its cradle. “Andy? Yeah, I have to call you that, Andromalius is a fucking mouthful…wait, what?!”

“What is it?” Hazel demanded, but Shane gave her the universal gesture for shut up I’m on the phone. 

“Everyone has paperwork. Are you telling me she was never going to die? Everyone is going to die. The _Antarctic?!”_ He sat back in his chair, face a picture of incredulity. “So what do we do? She’s not meant to be here, not for another forty years. Alright, less lip from you, Andy. Don’t forget who I murdered to get this job.”

Hazel felt bile rising in her throat as Shane hung up the phone. 

“So, two options: you stay here with a demon childminder until we get this shit sorted, or you can come home with me.”

“Where – where does the Devil live?”

“I’m not the Devil, and I live in Los Angeles. For the irony. Though I’m not the devil.”

There was a knock at the door and an eldritch horror slithered into the room. It waved an indescribable tentacle at her, and Hazel threw up before squeezing her eyes shut. 

“Jeez…you can clean that up, right? Okay, I’m calling it a night. See ya later, Merihem.” Shane grabbed his jacket from the back of his chair and a briefcase from nowhere at all. “Hazel, you coming or staying?”

“Coming,” She croaked, scrambling to her feet and swallowing back further nausea before hurrying after him and out the door.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is actually an original story that i started to write before i ever saw bfu and later realised would be a perfect fit for Shane and Ryan

**ABOVE**  
“So, she gets a visit from a dude with a hoof for a foot, then she goes insane.” Shane said, flicking his torch around the drawing room. The high ceilings flashed light for a moment and then receded back into shadow. 

“Yeah,” Ryan confirmed, gulping slightly. “Anne Tottenham suffered from terrible mental illness, and died shortly after. There have been reports of, uh, poltergeist activity in the house.”

“Like that movie with the clown doll?”

“No, you doof. A malevolent spirit.”

“So, Goat Foot Dude – that’s his official title, I’m calling it – no other clues that he wasn’t entirely human?”

“It’s all word of mouth, but no. He was young, very pleasant. They played cards.”

“So anyone could be the Devil,” Shane mused. “I could be the Devil.”

“Come on, dude. You’d tell me if you were the Devil.”

A floorboard creaked, and Shane swung round to flash his light in Ryan’s face with a crooked grin. “I’m the Devil. I’m here to tempt you by following you into haunted houses and complaining the entire time. Eventually you’ll give in to Wrath…and your soul will be mine.”

Ryan simply rolled his eyes, the whites flashing in the vague torchlight. The furniture around them rose high in shadow, cutting a path through the old house. The parlour had wide windows (for a 16th century house) looking across the flat land of the peninsula – all dark, covered by the black velvet sky overhead. It was a still, clear night, and moonlight filtered in, washing the parlour in pale light and throwing the dustsheet-covered furniture into sharp relief. Shane saw it first through a director’s eye, and noted what a killer shot it would make, and then through his own, and felt vaguely uneasy. 

“The ceiling,” Ryan said, pointing to a corner above the ornate fireplace. “That’s where the Devil went.” 

Shane looked, and saw nothing. “I see nothing.” It smelled of rain, and dust. 

“Really? It’s kinda discoloured. Right there.” Ryan pointed, but Shane couldn’t discern a difference in the white plaster. Maybe he would if they could switch the lights on, but that would ruin the atmosphere. 

“Mark, can you get a shot of that?” Ryan asked. He dutifully positioned the camera, but he gave Shane a look that clearly said he didn’t see it either. It was cold; a draught was washing gently through the room. 

They lit a fire in the grate – with a lot of bickering, and a lot of Ryan being obstinately a Californian – and sat back in dusty wingback chairs. 

“Don’t suppose you brought cards?” Shane asked. “We could play Spit.” 

“Nah. Woulda been good though.” Ryan said. “Why do people poke fires?”

“Well, they, uh…I actually have no idea.”

“You could have told me anything and I would have believed it.” Ryan said. “That’s how much I know about pokers.”

“Yeah, well, that’s your MO, isn’t it.”

“Poking things?”

“Believing everything you’re told.”

“Shut up, Shane.” Ryan lifted the poker, turning it idly side to side. “It’s sharp. This thing could be a damn weapon.” 

“If you wake me up in the night, I’m gonna use that to kill you.” Shane said. The flickering firelight reflected off Ryan’s teeth as he laughed. 

**BELOW**  
The office door opened onto nothing; blackness. Hazel gulped, even as Shane grabbed her hand and dragged her through – there was a noise like a parachute opening, a sheet flapping in the wind and then they were on a busy street. 

“Guh,” Hazel said, eloquently. 

“Good, right?” Shane shrugged his jacket on and turned the lapels up, despite the blazing sun. Everyone around was wearing t-shirts and shorts, but Shane didn’t seem bothered by the heat.  
They walked through the busy streets – “doesn’t the Devil get a car?” “you gonna complain all the way back?” – Hazel struggling to keep up with Shane’s long legs. She noted that whilst people’s attention was drawn by him (probably a byproduct of height) their eyes seemed to slide right over her. She supposed that the demon just cut an imposing figure. 

Eventually the bustle wore away, and they reached quieter side streets. A bus drove past, and Hazel flinched. The blast of the oncoming engine was very fresh in her mind. 

Shane produced a single key, and let the both of them through a non-descript door. Hazel wasn’t entirely sure what she expected – more flames? A weird sex dungeon? – but it was just a nice mid-size apartment. Hardwood floors. There was a vase of sunflowers on a table in the hallway. Much nicer than the house she’d shared with her dad. 

“Honey, I’m home!” Shane called, and another man thrust his head into the entryway. He was shorter than Shane by a wide margin, Asian, with dark hair and sharp cheekbones. Hazel thought he was vaguely familiar.

“You make that joke literally every day. It wasn’t even funny in the first place.”

“You gonna no homo me?” Shane said, taking off his dark jacket and hanging it on the wall. He popped the buttons on his cuffs and rolled up his sleeves as he kicked his shoes off, reaching round to scratch at his back between his shoulder blades awkwardly. “How was your day?” 

“Alright. Location went well. No more hordes of crows ruining the shoot.” Ryan called from the other room. The smell of tomatoes and garlic was wafting through the apartment. 

“Did you cook?” Shane asked, incredulous. Hazel followed him into the kitchen, which was piled high with pots and pans and boxes of protein powder. 

“Yeah!” The other guy said, offended. 

“Well, Ryan, this is Hazel. Hazel, Ryan.” Shane gestured to Hazel offhandedly. Ryan blinked.

“Dude…there’s no one there. Have you finally cracked?”

“I wonder that every day. But no, she’s there. She’s just dead.”

Ryan gulped, staring at a spot a little to the left of Hazel’s head. Curiously, she reached out and batted at one of the boxes of protein powder; she felt it like water as her hand went straight through, but she couldn’t shift it. 

“I recognise you,” She said aloud. “You’re that director. And the ghost guy.”

Shane snorted. “She said she knows you. You’re the ‘ghost guy.’”

“Says the actual ghost,” Ryan said. “You gonna, uh, bring dead people home often? Is this gonna be a thing now too?”

“No, Hazel’s an outlier.”

“Good, because it was bad enough dealing with the crows. And the wasps. And the storms.” 

Shane flopped down at one of the two chairs at the dining table, situated at a window offering a view of the darkening city. He sighed, shifting in his chair as if the back was bothering him. “You said, when all of this went down, ‘it’s fine man you can live with me! No worries!’” He did a half-hearted impression of Ryan’s nasal Californian. “You didn’t think rooming with a demon was gonna have issues?”

“I don’t know what I was thinking, to be honest,” Ryan huffed, turning back to stir something bubbling in the only clean pot in the room. Hazel concentrated, raised her hand high in the air, and slapped the box of the protein powder with all her might. It tipped forward and onto the tiled floor with a crash; Ryan leapt about six feet in the air. “Jesus H Christ!”

Shane winced. “Dude, you know the blasphemy is a problem for me.”

“Was that the dead girl?” Ryan demanded, clutching at his chest.

“My name is Hazel!” She said, and his head whipped round. Shane snorted, and waved a hand, and the spilled protein powder vanished. 

“You’re paying for a new box,” Ryan said, pointing at Shane with a wooden spoon. 

“You have literally fifty others.”

Ryan huffed, and started spooning pasta onto two plates. Hazel realised that it had been a full day, and she wasn’t hungry. The two guys sat down together, and Shane frowned. 

“This feels wrong.” He hurried out the room and returned with a third chair, wedging it into the small space between the table and the counter and gesturing Hazel towards it. She could feel the bars digging into her back. She didn’t feel very dead; the smell of the tomato sauce was sharp in her nostrils, her nails digging into the palms of her hands. 

“Ever the gentleman,” Ryan muttered, and Shane winked. Hazel wondered if she didn’t see a splash of red on Ryan’s cheeks. 

Darkness fell outside, and Shane did the washing up whilst Ryan scrolled through his phone idly. 

“I got this fantastic script this morning,” Ryan said, and Shane hummed. “Really scary stuff. I told her agent if I couldn’t make it I was gonna go be a hermit in the mountains forever.”

“If you’re a hermit, who am I going to share with?”

“Why can’t we keep living together?” 

“Do you – Ryan, you know what a hermit is? Right?”

Their bickering faded in and out, the bright kitchen lights flickering in the corners of her vision. Darkness fell, she floated for a second, and when her eyes blinked open again Shane was standing right in front of her.

“Jesus!” She jolted backwards. “Did I – fall asleep?”

“You’re never going to sleep again,” Shane said, grim-faced. “But oblivion beckons. It’s a ghost thing.” 

**ABOVE**  
They rolled out their bedding in the parlour, underneath the Devil Hole, as Shane had taken to calling it. In the flickering firelight, Ryan’s black eyes were wide with fear. 

“You absolutely can’t see it? It’s like…a water stain. But it’s terrifying.”

“You do this every single time,” Shane sighed. “Goat Foot Dude isn’t still up there.” 

“He's reported to have visited the house several times. Have you considered that the official title might cause some confusion between him and the Goatman?”

“That’s why I went for dude instead of man. How about GFD?”

“Either way, if he’s still around, we are getting murdered in our sleep.” Ryan muttered, eyes flickering back to the ceiling almost involuntarily. “The Loftus family had the hall exorcised by a Catholic priest in 1898, but apparently the ghost of Anne still hangs around. Lots of staff claim to have seen her.”

“The OG victim of the GFD.” 

The ceiling overhead creaked and Ryan inhaled sharply. The draught picked up suddenly, causing the fire in the grate to flicker wildly and turn Ryan’s face into a collection of pitted shadows before returning to usual. 

“A warning?” Ryan asked quietly. Shane reached out and clapped a hand on his shoulder, a quick squeeze of reassurance. 

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

They wandered carefully up the grand staircase, moonlight spilling in from the wide skylight overhead. The wallpaper was peeling, unwilling to let the visitors forget how many years the house had stood there. 

Over the parlour was a bedroom, with parquet floors and a single iron framed bed. Ryan jittered around the room.

“If he leapt through the ceiling in 1666, would he really still be here?” Shane asked pointedly. 

“Just – let me have this, okay? I wanna last the night.” Ryan said, clutching the torch like a weapon. 

Shane said nothing, and Ryan nodded, as if to say thanks. 

**BELOW**  
Hazel sat on the sofa in the little apartment, knees drawn up to her chest. Shane was pacing. Ryan was sat next to Hazel, but he wasn’t aware of it. The sofa looked comfy, though Hazel couldn’t feel it. 

“So, here’s the deal: ghosts aren’t real.” Shane said, and Ryan scoffed.

“I can’t believe you’re still standing by that when you literally run Hell.”

“People die and they leave this plane. To come to us, or somewhere else, I don’t know. Anyone who escapes and tries to exist on this plane without a mortal body is in trouble.”

“So…what happens to Ghost Girl?” Ryan asked. Shane swung around to face him, framed on either side by the movie posters on the wall, of movies Hazel recognised and didn’t. One had _A Ryan Bergara Picture_ on the bottom, and a fancy frame as well. 

“Hazel is going to deteriorate in spirit until she doesn’t exist anymore. Oblivion. People try to escape Hell all the time, and more often than not they’re gone by the time we get to them.”

“Isn’t oblivion better than Hell?” Hazel asked.

“When it comes down to it, most people choose to keep existing. Especially the kind of people we get down below.” Shane said grimly. 

“So what do I do?”

“Honestly, I don’t know. Your paperwork is all wrong. You weren’t supposed to die.”

“Weren’t-” Hazel spluttered.

“You _know_ when everyone is going to die?!” Ryan interrupted. 

“Vaguely,” Shane waved his hands awkwardly. “Please don’t ask me how you’re going to die. I don’t know, and if I did I wouldn’t tell you.”

“If I wasn’t supposed to die, can you – send me back?!” Hazel demanded, springing to her feet. “Put me back!”

“Look, I don’t have that kind of authority. And I don’t know who does. I’m working absolutely blind here.” Shane put his hands out placatingly. “I swear, I’m going to try to fix it.”

“I don’t understand why this is happening!” She cried, fisting her hands in her hair in frustration. “I’m just Hazel, I earn minimum wage, I spend most of my time hanging out with my dad. What is this?! Why am I in Hell?!”

“You’re not technically in Hell anymore-”

“Maybe this is still Hell,” She said, swinging round to face Shane. “How do I know this isn’t some Good Place shit?”

“No spoilers,” Shane said weakly.

“What the fuck are you guys talking about?” Ryan said, looking around the room even though he was unable to see Hazel.

“Don’t swear in front of her, she’s like, sixteen-”

“I’m _twenty!_ ” She yelled and the lights flickered wildly. 

“Woah.” Ryan said, eyes wide with fear. “What did she do?”

“I’m right here.” She said, feeling her throat close up. “I’m – please-” She felt something roll down her cheek and fall to the ground without making a splash or a sound. She gasped clumsily and finally Ryan looked directly at her.

“I can hear a woman crying,” He said. Shane just stared at her, seemingly incapable of dealing with a weeping girl. “Dude, if that’s Hazel, you’d better do something.”

“Like what?” Shane hissed.

“Hug her?! I dunno!” Ryan threw his hands in the air and left the sitting room, muttering to himself angrily. Shane reached out awkwardly and patted Hazel on the shoulder – the only thing she’d felt properly since leaving the office. She hiccupped quietly, and swiped at her eyes with one sleeve. She realised she was still wearing the windbreaker and skinny jeans she’d died in.

“Some ghost,” She muttered.

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t look like a Victorian waif,” She gestured to her outfit. 

“Well, the jacket is far more practical,” Shane said. “A real 21st century spirit. I promise, I’m going to try to fix this for you, Hazel.”

“I just…don’t understand why this is happening,” She sighed, and Shane patted her on the shoulder again.

“We’ll figure it out.”

 **ABOVE**  
The fire was dying in the grate as Ryan shrugged his jacket off and shoved it under his head as extra pillow, facing Shane on their bedding rolls. 

“Kinda whack that people are always going mad in the ancient times,” He murmured. “Poor Anne was probably really suffering and they were all like ‘uh hoo she was touched by the Devil’”

TJ and Mark had left for the hotel; Ryan was still filming on his Go Pro. 

“I mean it, Ryan. I want to sleep tonight.” Shane had felt jittery all evening, beyond usual for any so-called haunted location. Probably jet-lag. 

“Whatever. One of us has to keep look-out for the GFD.” Ryan said, rolling his eyes at Shane’s glee that he used the acronym. 

“G’night, Ryan.” Shane whispered. “I pray my soul the Goat Dude keep.”

“Don’t even joke, man. Don’t even.”

Shane felt his eyelids droop as Ryan switched his torch out, as the embers of the fire burned lower and lower. He was cosy in his sleeping bag despite the draught in the parlour, and he felt sleep creeping slowly closer. 

Then it was sunset, and he was sat in the parlour with a young woman in period dress. The furniture was out from under the dust sheets, and surprisingly new; the dying rays of the sun across the peninsula caused them to cast long shadows. The wallpaper all stuck completely to the walls. Shane could see the sunlight glinting off the sea, far in the distance.

“Are you prepared?” The young woman said, her auburn hair pulled back in a low bun. She had a gentle Irish brogue and deep-set eyes. 

“For what?” Shane asked. He realised he was wearing a cravat. 

“Your fate.” The woman said, placing a card on the table between them. 

“If yooouuu had the chance to change yer fate, would ya?” Shane said, a mocking imitation of that Disney film. 

“I would. And I think you would too, if you knew it.” She said solemnly, placing another card down. It was the King of Diamonds. 

He was dragged out of sleep like breaking the surface of cold water; Ryan was crouching over him with terror in his eyes, shaking him hard.

“What is it?” Shane mumbled, batting his hands away. Ryan fell back, shivering, and pointed towards the hallway.

“Someone just knocked at the front door.”

**Author's Note:**

> I lack motivation so the update schedule for this is going to be Sporadic At Best, but I appreciate anyone who's willing to stick around for the ride. This is the most ambitious thing I've ever done, so any feedback is welcomed - you can find me on [tumblr](https://www.thatmademadej.tumblr.com).


End file.
